Erik Brunvand, and Nina McCurdy

University of Utah

Making Noise:Using SoundArt toExplore TechnologicalFluencyREPRINT

From Proceedings of 2017 ACM SIGCSE Conference. Reprinted with permission

We describe our experience designing and delivering a general education technological fluency course that
frames the discussion of computer science and engineering
technology (electronics and programming) in the context of
sound-art: art that uses sound as its medium. This course
is aimed at undergraduate students from a wide variety of
backgrounds and is designed to fit into the “Intellectual
Explorations” area of a general undergraduate program. The
goal is to introduce computer engineering and computational
principles to non-CS students through an exploration of
sound-art, experimental and electronic music, noise-making
circuits, hardware hacking, and circuit bending.

INTRODUCTION

In 1997 the National Science Foundation (NSF) asked theNational Research Council (NRC) to study the question of whatAmericans should know about information technology. TheNRC released a landmark report in 1999 entitled “Being Fluentwith Information Technology” [ 15]. An equally influentialfollow-on report was issued by the NRC in 2002 entitled“Technically Speaking: Why All Americans Need to Know MoreAbout Technology” [ 16]. These reports stress that technologicalliteracy does not suffice in modern times. Literacy implies onlybasic knowledge of a subject. The 1999 report adopted the termfluency to describe “[intellectual] capabilities [to] empowerpeople to manipulate the medium to their advantage and tohandle unintended and unexpected problems when they arise”[ 15]. The 2002 report continues this theme, proposing to broadentechnological fluency to include basic engineering knowledge,and the nature and limitations of the engineering design process[ 16]. This theme has echoed through the NSF resulting in callsfor education to include computational thinking throughout thecurriculum [ 4, 42]. As prices fall and access increases for “maker”materials (e.g., open-source hobbyist computing platformslike Arduino [ 1]), computer integration with physical devices(sensors and actuators) has emerged as a new and importantfacet of technological fluency.In spite of the rise of technological tools, and the reports de-scribing the critical nature of technology in a general educationalsetting, general education requirements for undergraduates areslow to change. At the University of Utah, for example, under-graduate students are required to take six classes in “intellectualexploration” of areas that are not in their major. The areas they canchoose from are Fine Arts, Humanities, Social & Behavioral Sci-ence, and Applied Science. The Applied Science category, whichcould contain CS and engineering courses, is focused instead onexperimental science in areas such as chemistry, biology, etc.

To position this course as an interesting choice for a wide
variety of non-CS undergraduate students, we developed the
course specifically to introduce computer science and engineering technology related to electronics and programming
through the lens of experimental and electronic music and
sound-art projects. Essentially, this is a way to increase the stu-